Olive Bread

This olive bread is perfect for al fresco summer evenings. The olives may be substituted with green olives or any other, of your choice.

If you want to plait your bread, have a look at my Olive Bread video on Instagram.

10g instant yeast

340ml water, lukewarm

10g sugar

10ml salt

20ml olive oil

500g cake flour

250ml black olives, pitted

Pour the lukewarm water into a bowl and sprinkle the yeast on it. Stir well and put aside.

Add the flour, sugar, salt and olive oil to the bowl of a stand mixer, fitted with the dough hook.

Turn the mixer on to low speed and add the yeast mixture to it.

Allow the machine to knead the dough for 6 minutes.

Lightly oil a clean bowl and turn the dough into it. Cover with a clean tea towel and allow to rise to double the volume, or about an hour.

Preheat your oven to 180℃.

Turn the dough out onto a work surface and add the olives. Lightly knock the dough down and incorporate the olives at the same time. If a few falls out, simply stick it back into the dough.

Now shape your dough and give it a drizzle with some more olive oil.

Allow the bread to proof until puffy, for about 20 minutes.

Remove the tea towel and bake the bread for 20 minutes, until lightly golden.

Remove and drizzle with olive oil once more.

Allow to cool before devouring it!